Microsoft Corp.'s Xbox 360 video game console will launch interactive ads on TV this fall in a bid to steal more business away from television networks.

The
tech giant has signed Toyota, Unilever and Samsung Mobile to its
offering, called NUads, which will debut this fall. People who use the
Xbox to watch video via apps from Microsoft partners -- including ESPN, TMZ, NBC News and the UFC -- will see the new ad formats.

In
their first iteration, the NUads will let users vote in response to
questions asked in the ads. Toyota's spots, for instance, will ask users
what other devices they would like to see "reinvented" the way the
company has "reinvented" some of its auto models.

Users can vote by clicking a
button on a controller or speaking or gesturing with their hands when
using the Xbox 360 add-on called Kinect that includes a camera and
microphone.

Toyota will then have access to the data on how people voted and demographic information on the voting blocs.

Microsoft
is aiming to charge what Ross Honey, general manager of entertainment
and advertising for the Xbox Live online service, called a "premium"
compared with typical commercial rates.

"There have been
interactive ads on the Web before, but the beauty of it is that we're
bringing that to the TV," he said. "It's a substantially more valuable
ad product."

Unilever plans to use NUads to promote its Axe body spray line.

Stealing
a significant chunk of the $68 billion U.S. TV advertising business
will be a huge challenge, given the sizable audiences that can be
aggregated at a single time on traditional TV, not to mention major
advertisers' conservative tendencies.

But as more marketing
executives become comfortable spending big money online, Microsoft hopes
it offers an attractive middle ground by putting the benefits of the
Web on a TV screen.

It's part of a larger move by Microsoft to
take viewing time away from cable and satellite services by making the
Xbox 360 the most popular device for getting video into the living room
from the Internet. The strategy was a primary focus of the company's
news conference at the E3 industry event last week, at which it premiered new partnerships with Univision and the NBA, among others.

Microsoft's
ad revenue on the Xbox 360 has grown 140% from the same period in 2010,
Honey said, though he declined to specify the total amount. "It's small
for us but in the context of most companies it's substantial," he
stated. "We're well ahead of just a few million dollars a year."

Xbox
Live has more than 40 million subscribers. Microsoft has not specified
how many use the video services that are part of NUads, but has
disclosed that its online users spend more than half their time
streaming video and music rather than playing games.

1 comment:

Jana
said...

Just when Americans, through TiVo, thought they were leading in the fight against commercials, Microsoft Corp. comes up with the brilliant idea of interactive ads, targeting 40 million subscribers. Could it be that that those possessing skills in creativity and critical thinking will hold America’s “hot jobs?” Hold on “Imagineers”; we’re not in Disney anymore. Jana Hum/114

About Me

Actor, Casting Director, Director, Broadcaster, Writer, Singer, Artistic
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Professional and life long student Art Lynch joined the staff of John Robert
Powers in 1999. Lynch is also an adjunct professor at the Community College of
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one of 67 individuals who represent 126,000 actors as a member of the Board of
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from UNLV and a BA in Theater, Speech and Mass Communications from the
University of Illinois, Chicago. He is currently pursuing post-graduate studies
in theater, education and the entertainment industry. Art Lynch studied and
practiced the craft of acting in Chicago and California before settling in
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company with national clientele. Art was personally responsible for casting and
directing over 1,000 commercials and industrials, as well as assisting on film
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as a wire service, magazine and broadcast journalist. He is most proud,
however, of his daughters. Ann is a PhD in neuroscience and Beth is the proud
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